Spooky Tour with API!

*Warning SUPER SUPER long post ahead*

I left home on Saturday evening for an experience that I would never do on any usual basis. I went for a spooky tour with the Asia Paranormal Investigators! Diana, who is part of their team secured me an exclusive seat on the tour bus for that evening.

I have always found the paranormal to be very interesting in some ways and was obviously intruiged at what I may experience on this trip! When Diana called in the afternoon, I was in the middle of a lazy afternoon nap. Groggily picking up the phone I heard her say "eh! I got you a place on the bus for tonight's haunted tour!" Wah!! *Thank u moley!!! muaks!*

I checked in with hubby that he would be alright if I went and he said "Go lah! Enjoy yourself, just ensure u're not having your period, err don't want anything to be attracted to blood" *Eeeeee!! shiver! Heng heng.. not bleeding*

That evening, after preparing my bag with the needed necessities: Water Bottle, Camera, HP, Mozzie Patches, lip balm, a torch light and throwing on a tshirt, jeans, socks and shoes.. I headed out of my place to take the train to meet her at Dover MRT at 1130pm. She drove past and picked me up and we moved on and I met the famous "Abductboy!" aka Charles Goh, Founder of API. He was a really sweet guy and very friendly! Charles is Singapore's ONLY liscenced Spooky Tour Guide in Singapore. There's only one liscense and he has it. I'm sure he earned it well too with his vast knowledge of the supernatural and his experiences.

Soon after, Charles's brother came, Raymond Goh which they lovingly called "Feng Shui". He also was very accomodating and friendly and he's also a Feng Shui master.. thus the name... ahhhh... *Pam nodding like as if I understand* haahah he also reads and deciphers tombstone writings! How interesting!

Apparently, they all call each other by nicknames *which in a sense may be a good thing esp when you're out on a ghost hunt, you wouldn't exactly want to be calling each other by your real names".

So we headed down to the inner carpark of Singapore Poly where we met a whole group of Singapore Poly students who engaged API for that evening's spooky tour. It was really a full house on the bus. Every seat was taken! I felt priviledged to be there as a guest.

Abductboy was really like a tour guide! He stood in front, introduced his great team and also introduced me as one of his guest photo journalist! Hhahaha kua kua kua... me? Photo journalist! I still waved to the rest of the bus in acknowledgement as if it were real... Halloo!! *beam*

We started off the bus ride watching some videos... mainly videos from the ring and watching Sadako in different versions.. hahaha.. then some famous indonesian pontianak video clip and an advertisement of some child that died after the ad was taken because of a "ghostly" girl that was holding on to him during the filming of the advertisement. *shiver* Moley says is a hoax but stuff like that still make my hair stand.. esp when it involves children. Eeeeeeee!!!!

Abductboy throught the tour ride gave us alot of background of where we were headed, a little too much information for me to remember so I guess if you really want to know, you may need to go on one of API's tours just to get the full information direct from the man himself. You can however, try to google for more details if you're really interested from the list of places that I'll be putting down here in this post.

First location: Hillview Mansion...

Apparently this was one of Singapore's popular haunted mansions with alot of myths and stories surrounding this house.. "Feng Shui" also mentioned a little about the feng shui of the mansion and how it had REALLY bad fengshui... *cannot remember details.. something about tigers and dragons on the land... etc.. etc... really can't remember* I googled some pictures and found that Abductboy once uploaded some more pictures taken at Hillview Mansion itself here.

There are other shots from other locations that can be found here.

When we arrived at that Bukit Timah location, the bus stopped at a very steep slope. I looked up in dread and went "oh my god, so it begins..." and I plodded up the slope slightly wheezing when I reached the top (point to note: aiyohh!! still not fit enough!!).

We were all expecting to see a house but it turned out that there was a landslide some time back and they demolished the house. -.-'' *grumble - how to see haunted house without the house leh??* anyway....

I supposed you can check out the images from the link above which Abductboy took when the house was still around. The gate was still there so I took a picture of that... the gate was grand and huge!.. it must have been nice in its hay day.

There was a side drain leading up the hill and stairs right beside it. Some API team members lead the group up this side path and we hopped over the drain to stand on Hillview Mansion land.

The grass was slippery and it was muddy and squishy but we all stood there basking in the view. It truely had a magnificent view. After telling us a little story and some more details about the place, we all slowly and carefully headed back down the grassy plain to hop back over the drain. I felt bugs and mozzies flying around and immediately started pasting mozzie patches all over my shirt.

Everyone made tiny steps and everyone was mumbling "be careful, be careful". My turn came and I was the 2nd last one in the whole group of people. And guess what...

I had to slip and flump right onto my fluffy plump ass RIGHT ONTO the "cursed" land of Hillview Mansion... ARGHHHHHHH!!! I got up quickly, a little out of exasperation a little out of embarassment.. why only I had to fall down leehh!!... *wails* Swatting my butt and grumbling on the way down the slope to the bus... the night was only beginning..

Next we headed down to Choa Chu Kang Cemetary. Oh man!! CCK cemetary IS ONE HUUUGEEE PLACE!!! Its so big that its literally as far as the eyes can see.. all graves. I silently said to myself that I want to be cremated and not buried when I die. It just looked too gloomy and scary to be lying there for all eternity.. (well, actually not ALL eternity... it turns out that you only have that grave slot for only a 15 year tenure! After that.. u have to be exhumed by your spouse/children/relatives and relocated or cremated...might as well just go direct to cremation...)

What was going on a spooky tour without going into a cemetary right?! We neared the main gate and Abductboy let out a whoot! He saw candles on the gate and he announced " you see the candles there! that means theres something going on tonight inside! " I started to get excited but also a little fearful... afterall.. it was a cemetary we're going into...

The bus drove in. We noted that the roads in the cemetary were really narrow and it was difficult for the bus to manouver, especially since we had a full load on board. We drove about for a short while, slowly while Abductboy told us about the different things we might look out for ie 4D/Toto punters where they would come with a medium and alot of food offering & hell money and choose a grave to pray to for special numbers. Once they chose one and placed their offering, they would light a pathway of candles so lead the spirit to the offering...

We looked around to see if we could find a path of candles and see the ritual for ourselves. We couldn't find it. We looked around for little green tents covering graves and night lights where exhumations were supposed to be taking place.. nothing either.

Then we saw something in the distance.

Several rows of flames, candles and fires could be seen and we stopped the bus to take a look. There were about 20 by 10 tombs that were lit with large candles and there was a medium doing some ritual with the fire. We could see him jumping about and flailing some flags and throwing them into the fire. We all wanted to get closer so the bus moved on..

The bus turned towards the direction of the spectacle and turned a couple more times and then we were lost. The place was simply so huge and dark that we couldn't find our way to those twinkling lights. We looked around and saw a convoy of trucks, cars and even 2 empty taxis driving in. Curious, we waited and there was a joke on the bus where they wondered "why the empty taxis" To drive WHO out?

Soon enough, the trucks drove past us and we all realised. "TANG KIs!!!" A few of them all fully dressed in their Tank Ki tall hats and costumes! Great!! They must be going for some ritual!

What is a Tang-Ki anyway? The name is derived from Chinese dialect that means Taoist trance mediums in general. They are more than being able to perform self-mortification without pain, speak with divine wisdom and perform exorcism. During Taoist divine occasions, these mediums allow deities into their bodies soon after they enter a state of trance. Their bodies then become a medium for the entities to possess. The deities on behalf of Tang-Ki's physical bodies communicate and give blessings to people."

Anyway.. we tried to chase them down and follow them to see where they were going so that we could observe what they were up to.. a few turns later. We lost them....

Arghhh!!! Frustrating can! We all then gave up and headed towards another part of the cemetary where there were little tiny gravestones sticking out of the ground. It was all like little 20 by 15cm numbered granite stones sticking out of the ground.

According to Abductboy, these were the gravestones of the un-named. Those that were not claimed for some reason or another. Many of them probably children graves too.

There was a little shelter where we saw a family. It turns out that the family goes there almost every night to light candles and give offerings to these unnamed graves/souls as a good deed. Sometimes, they bring their children too to light each tomb-let on special days like Christmas or Children's Day to let these un-named souls know that they are not forgotten.

We were inside this shelter where there was an earth god altar and some other prayer stuff. There was also this marble plaque on the wall which "Feng Shui" translated which said something about acknowledging the burial area for the unnamed.

Moley came beside me when we came down from the bus and whispered to me "can you see the little children running around?" I replied hastily. "NOO!" and promptly shut my eyes and silently went EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!

She looked around and went "yup! so many little children all around"... I stood rooted to the ground with my hair standing and shortly we both went back up the bus... I am SO NOT GOING TO STAND THERE with little ghost children running around me.

The bus left the cemetary and I tried not staring too deep into the darkness in case I ended up seeing "something" I didn't want to see.

The next location was at Marsiling. On any normal basis, if not for this trip, I would have never set foot into the next location. We stopped by the side of the road and was asked to get down.

The API crew passed around insect repellant OFF and I gladly took it and sprayed it generously all over my arm. *later, I was glad I did because the mozzies were HUGE!!* My mozzie patches cannot compare w liquid OFF on my arm.. hahaha

We stepped past a side drain and into the forested area and walked inwards for about 3 minutes and reached a small clearing. The clearing had several altars. All of different kinds.. from Buddha..to Taoist altars, to Ganesha - the Indian Elephant God.

It was so unusual to see so many types in once place.. there was even an actual staff *kinda like the Triton from the Sea God in the little Mermaid* stuck in the ground and decorated with flowers, lime and offerings.

Abductboy then explained each altar and interesting significances. He then lead us deeper into the forested area towards a tree. As we got closer, we noticed that there was a red cloth tied around the tree and this signified "blood". We saw also that the tree had a face *drawn* and this was supposed to be another indian god named "Kali". Details about her can be found here.


Another point that was mentioned that if you were familiar with the story of Adrian Lim.. the Singaporean Murderer aka Devil Worshipper.. he also used to take children's blood as a sacrifice to Kali... *eeeeeeeeeee*

Okay next... we all headed back to the bus and drove past this road called Neo Tew Road where there was this place called the Abandoned Ghost Town. This place was a row of abandoned HDB flats that is now sometimes being used by the army for internal training sessions.

Apparently this place, isn't very "clean" either. We didn't have the chance to go into this "town" but we drove very slowly past to see how deserted the place was and also watched videos that API once took while on investigation.. clips showing a playground that was moving and playing like as if there were real children playing.. rocking horses rocking and THERE WAS NO ONE. *no one that could be seen on video at least* I guess you can google this place up if you're interested to know and see more.

We then continued on our bus ride and headed towards the Woodlands Causeway where we were told of a secret tunnel that the British used a very long time ago when Singapore was still a British colony. Details can be found here.

This was where we approached this forested area by bus to be greeted by several altars of Guan Yin by the roadside plus several others that lined the road way. Everyone manned themselves with a torch light, covered themselves with insect repellant and we all went on our way into the forested area. It was pitch dark and the only lights were our little torches that lit our path.

Like before, the grass was slippery and the ground muddy from the rain the night before. We trekked up little mounds, down soil patches, through trees. I was starting to wonder why I even decided to come along the trip as it was something I would never usually do on any regular basis.

Trekking through some strange forested area with a bunch of strangers in the dark with a torchlight that doesn't work too well, looking for some strange location that MAY be haunted and wearing a pair of jeans that is too loose that some red ants decided to crawl up and bite my fat legs. *ants in my pants! ants in my pants!!* (smack smack smash!!!) Point to note: wear fitted pants next time. If there is ever a next time.

As you probably could tell, I didn't look too glam smashing my own legs in the semi darkness.

We finally reached it and I stood there to take a picture. It only looks bright here because of my camera's flash if not, we were greeted by a faint outline of the place that our torch lights tried to illuminate.

We all were encouraged to check it out and so we all did. Gingerly.


Stepping down the dark stairwell.. we were warned of potential BATS that may fly about at our heads. OH GREAT. just... great..and LIZARDS...HUGE ONES AT THAT. They were so big they are pretty much 3 times bigger than those at my house! I like lizards... talking to them but huge ones would still freak me out. I did take the time to say Hi to around 3 of them though...

And lizard eggs! They're huge!! I've never seen lizard eggs before! Now I have.. hahaha

There were broken glass EVERYWHERE. Seriously NOT a place to trip and fall. We went down a few flights of stairs.. checking out the delapidated tunnel walls and noticing little toads hopping about then we came to some debris at the end of a flight of stairs. Almost everyone hopped over to see the end of the tunnel but I turned back.. I can jump down but NO guarantees that I can jump back up again.. so I went back up to "civilisation" with Moley, Abductboy and Feng Shui.

When everyone was up, we trekked through the forest till we came to 3 huge pipes. I stared down and realised that we actually had to climb over those pipes! I nearly hyperventilated. I knew my shoes were slippery. The pipes were wet and there was no way I could get past without help.

Abductboy hopped over the pipes and stood there offering a hand. I grabbed it tightly and gingerly stepped on each pipe silently praying "don't slip!!! pam! Don't slip!!". It would be TOTALLY UNGLAM to slip, fall, get stuck between those pipes and on my way down have my head and ass klang against the metal and go "kloonggggggg!!!!". Luckily, I made it. Moley was right behind me and saying "squat!! squat! or you'll not be able to jump down!". I did and I made it. Phew!!! Next thing I look back and I see moley doing a ducky on me. She squatted and waddled over the 3 pipes and jumped down like a pro.. wah!!!! hahaha

We all walked along the pipes till we came to a small opening in the bushes and I realised it was a road and we popped our head out to see our BUS! hahahhaha.. SO CHUN.

Imagine a whole row of forestry and then suddenly u see this.

A steady stream of humans popping out of no where and jumping over the drain. ahahahaha. I could see that everyone was relieved to get out of the forest.

There was one student however who started to hyperventilate for some reason and we all took a while while she was calming down and wiped her tears away.

I took the chance to take some photos of JB since we were right at the causeway. The scene was nice.

And this is us! at 4+am in the morning.. at some weird forested area at Marsiling hahhaa... I look happy because I survived the pipe climb! hahahha Moley just looks sleepy.

The next location was called Devil's Bend located at Old Upper Thomson Road.

It used to be a grand prix race track in the 1960s. Devils Bend proved to be a particularly sharp corner where many drivers met their end. It was believed that the race track was closed down in the 1970s due to high fatal accidents there. It is obvious enough to know where the name Devil's Bend come from. Such a high fatal accident rate has made this particular traffic black spot a haunted place.It was said that some souls of the drivers did not realize they were dead yet. Their souls continue to roam around that particular sharp corner as if they were still trying their best to make it, over and over again...

We drove slowly past this area just to have a look at this location whilst on our way to our final location... Tomb House at Ca Fey Shan aka Coffee Hill at Bukit Brown.

Many years ago before the Gov't changed the road name Lornie Road the expressway was then known as Korphee Hill (pronounced as Coffee Hill). Legends has it that Korphee Hill used to be a coffee plantation with a village nearby.

There was once a young little girl born to a woman who died during childbirth, to which less than a month later the baby girl's grandfather passed away too. Everyone in the village regarded the baby girl as a taboo and a curse to the village.

Everyone shunned her, including her close ones who treated her no better than a servant. The young girl led a very hard yet simple life, toiling most of her life working in the coffee plantation.Many years passed and the young girl grew into her teens. One late evening as the girl was walking through the plantation after a hard day's work, she was brutally attacked and sexually assaulted by a group of male villagers. They abhorred her since the very day she was born.

The deep grudge for her as a curse to the village overpowered them and they decided to kill her in a means to silence their victim. The girl put up a hard struggle but to no avail. Beaten and insulted, the girl swore and cursed the entire village and plantation with her last breath that no coffee was to be ever planted on the land she grew on, nor any references or jokes made about coffee is to be mentioned on Korphee Hill.True enough, not long after the girl's demise, the plantation begin to falter and all growing coffee trees and weeds died.

The whole land became almost barren. Children and adults alike who spoke of coffee died horrible deaths within 3 days of the word Coffee mentioned. Soon, words of the girl's curse spread through the village like fire and everyone evacuated the village as not only are their lives in danger of the dead girl's wrath, their livelihood of producing the country's trade, coffee had ceased.

We stopped by the side of the road which lead to a path and switched on our torch lights. The road was paved with tar and was a smooth road for us to walk apart from the many leaves and twigs. Random graves and tombstones of various sizes also lined the side of the road.

Feng Shui stopped at several tombs to explain why it looked that way and how u read it. Interesting general knowledge. Not something that I foresee being useful to me but still interesting.

We headed down to a place which they called Tomb House. It was not really a house per-say but more of a sheltered area where a caretaker stayed to take care of a particular tomb. A tomb of a man named Tan Boon Cheng.

On our way there, it started to rain so we all ran towards this Tomb House and took shelter there.

It was interesting to see how the caretaker lived. He was truely a poor man with very little material possessions. He gathers rain water to wash clothes, to bathe and to drink too.

There was also an assortment of animals there too!

We were greeted by 2 dogs when we first arrived in the drizzle. Upon entering, we saw he had cages of squirrels too! 5 to be exact.. 2 singles and one family of 3. Awww... He had bottles of fish.. and MANY MANY birds. There was also a cat family living there.

It rained hard and we stood in the tomb stranded. Feng Shui gave a tutorial on how to read a tombstone and it was enlightening to know how much you can tell about a person just by what is written on their tombstone.

Abductboy then went on to tell army stories to interested students while the bored ones started playing Cheee Koo Pak *a hand game like scissors paper stone*

We stayed there till almost close to 6am where the rain started to slow down and some API crew ran to get umbrellas from the bus some way back. Slowly, everyone was ferried out in umbrellas to the bus till all returned and the bus headed back to Singapore Poly.

On the way back.. everyone had the chance to meet one final celestial being.

The God of Sleep.

ZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...........

hAHHAH.. everyone excluding the bus driver of course, fell asleep up to the point where Abductboy stood up and announced "Thank you everyone for coming on API's spooky tour!".

I could hear people swiping up drool, mumbling in their half drowsy state as we all stumbled out of the bus.

I stumbled to Diana's car.. amazed that she still can drive and she drove an NTU student back.. drove me back.. and went home.

I was exhausted when I reached home. Peeled all my clothes off, threw it in the washing machine. Did a quick scrub of my shoes to wash off all the mud, took a quick shower and crashed into bed.

I didn't wake up till 4pm that day. Phew! Interesting experience. If you're interested in something like this.. check our API's website for tours and maybe you might want to gather a group of friends to give this a try too!

It costs $15 per head for students and $20-$25 per adult depending on the number of people in the group only!!!! Super affordable lah! I'd pay this for something so unique! Abductboy also mentions that they will be having some new tours in November onwards as they're working with National Parks.. so look out for that! Free one somemore!

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